It is virtually one great state having the same basis of general law, with some diversity of provincial customs and local establishments.
Edmund Burke: “It is virtually one great state having the same basis of general law, with some diversity of provincial customs and…”
Editor's note · Context
Burke describes Europe as a single entity with a shared legal foundation, despite local variations.
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A few years ago I should be ashamed to overload a matter so capable of supporting itself by the then unnecessary support of any argument; but this seditious, unconstitutional doctrine is now publicly taught, avowed, and printed.
They have little regard to the obvious consequences of their doctrine, though they may see that it leaves positive authority in very few of the positive institutions of this country.
If all the absurd theories of lawyers and divines were to vitiate the objects in which they are conversant, we should have no law and no religion left in the world.
This idea of a liberal descent inspires us with a sense of habitual native dignity, which prevents that upstart insolence almost inevitably adhering to and disgracing those who are the first acquirers of any distinction.





